Springtime has arrived and we have an extra hour of daylight to play with.

Make it a goal to spend an hour outside each day that you can. Pick up an a volunteer shift somewhere outside. Join a tree planting group or a park cleanup! Take your kids on a walk or call up a friend and invite them to go to the park.

Sensible amounts of sun can cheer you up and is good for your body! The Vitamin D you get from even 15 minutes a day in the sun is essential for absorbing calcium and keeping our bones healthy. It can help protect you from a myriad of diseases and ailments such as osteoporosis, heart disease, Type II diabetes and multiple sclerosis.

Do not make things more complicated than they need to be. If we focus on the things that matter most to us, we are more likely to experience what the holiday season is all about: peace, hope, the potential for miracles, reconciliation and the triumph of light over dark.

Keep things meaningful and simple. Less work, less stress and less expense means more time, more money and more happiness.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, as many as 3.2 million Americans are living with a permanent disability resulting from a brain injury. They report that 1.7 million Americans sustain a traumatic brain injury (TBI) each year. Fifty-two thousand people die from it. Almost a quarter-million people are hospitalized.

TBI can affect the foundations of who we are — our capacity to communicate and to think. For approximately 85 percent of people with TBI, these are problems that will slowly go away. The remaining 15 percent of people with TBI have lifelong difficulties. TBI can mean months or even a lifetime of rehabilitation and acquiring new coping skills.

TBI can be an overwhelming and confusing experience, one that has a tendency to bring psychological distress. It is common for anger, anxiety and depression to develop as a result of TBI, and it’s important that anyone experiencing these feelings seek out support and qualified care.

Damage to the part of the brain that controls behavior and emotions can change the way people both feel and express their emotions. Sometimes, this can result in mood swings or difficulty controlling emotional responses. According to research, around 70 percent of people with TBI experience irritability. Yelling, swearing and physical violence are all common behaviors.

These sudden emotional responses aren’t necessarily triggered by a particular event and emotion expression may not match the situation. This is something that generally resolves after the first few month of injury, but can be a real challenge for those in the caretaker role.

It is important that anyone experiencing these symptoms seek advice from physicians or psychologist familiar with the emotion problems caused by brain injury to find out the cause and get help with treatment. Doctors may recommend pharmaceutical mood stabilizers.

It’s also important for caretakers and loved ones to seek counseling and help with how to best handle these scenarios. It’s important that caretakers avoid reacting emotionally in these situations. Helping the person with TBI to regain control, acknowledging their feelings and helping talk through the experience can be helpful- but can be very challenging and it’s important that caretakers are also taking care of themselves.

Another common psychological response after TBI is anxiety. Experiencing TBI is by definition, a traumatic event, plus the injuries can impact a person’s abilities to handle that trauma. Difficulty with concentration and reasoning can easily make it hard to problem solve and a person with TBI is often dealing with many different demands. It’s not always possible to remove all of the stressors, but reducing unnecessary demands and ensuring there is a regular routine with structured activities can be helpful. Anxiety can also be helped by medications or psychotherapy if deemed appropriate by a professional.

Depression, frustration and feelings of sadness are normal responses to all of the trauma surrounding a brain injury. Often, these are feelings that show up in the later stages of recovery, once the urgent things have been dealt with and the long-term situation becomes apparent. Like these other psychological affects, signs of depression can also be symptoms of the brain injury itself. If they don’t show up immediately, but rather, in the later stages- it’s more likely to mean depression. It’s important to see a professional when you are experiencing signs of depression.

All of these symptoms are common to the TBI experience. Seeking help is important for recovery, from both professionals and loved ones. Another key support system can be peer support. As mentioned, TBI is a fairly common human experience and both peer support groups and peer mentoring likely exist in your area. Go to http://www.biusa.org to find brain injury resources close to you.

Works Cited

Angelle M. Sander, P. (2002). Picking up the Pieces after TBI: A Guide for Family Members. Baylor College of Medicine. Baylor College of Medicine.

By The Growth Place | September 20, 2016 at 06:51 PM EDT | No Comments

Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower. —Albert Camus

Autumn shows us how beautiful it is to let things go.

In the Northern Hemisphere, September and the Autumnal Equinox signal the beginning of autumn and a time to refocus our energies. We start wrapping up our gardens and our outdoor lifestyles and preparing for the winter. It's time to cuddle up! These still warm autumn days are an excellent time to focus in on the now. Settle in and appreciate the beauty of the changing leaves. Just like the animals preparing for a winter of hibernation, do things for yourself that will help you get through the winter with ease. Being mindful can help us be productive and successfully transition into the bustle of the winter season.

As the leaves turn and fall to the ground, focus on your own transformation. It's time to reflect and let go of the things you don't need.

What are those things for you? Old habits? Unhealthy relationships? Negative emotions? Breathe it all out and let it "fall" away!

The teachings of Buddhism are summed up in the Four Noble Truths. The 2nd of those Four Truths is that the origin of all suffering is attachment. On his website, Zen Habits, blogger, Leo Babauta has developed a very succinct list of ways to help dissolve attachments and let go. They are outlined here:

Letting Go Practices

Meditation. Meditation is simply sitting still and trying to pay attention to the present moment — whether that’s your breath, your body, or what’s around you right now. What you’ll find is that your mind runs away from the present moment, attaching to worries about the future, planning, remembering things in the past. In meditation, you practice letting go of these mini attachments, by noticing what your mind is doing and letting go, returning to the present moment. This happens again and again, and so you get good at it. It’s like muscle memory after doing it hundreds, thousands of times. You learn that whatever you were attached to is simply a story, a narrative, a dream. It’s not so heavy, just a bit of cloud that can be blown away by a breeze.

Compassion. In this meditation, you wish for an end to your suffering, or an end to the suffering of others. What happens is that this wish transforms you from being stuck in your attachment, to finding a warm heart to melt the attachment and find a way to ease it. You become bigger than your story, when you wish for your own suffering to end. And when you wish for others’ suffering to end, you connect yourself to them, see that your suffering is the same as theirs, understand that you’re in this together. What happens is that your attachments and story become less important, not such a big deal, as you connect with others in this way.

Interdependence. Try meditating not only on the wish for the suffering of others (and yourself) to end, but for others to be happy. All others, whether you like them or not. Again, through doing this, you start to see that you’re all connected in your suffering, and in your desire to be happy. You are not so separate from them. You’re not separate, but interdependence. This connection with others helps you to be less attached and more at ease with life.

Accepting. At the heart of things, attachment is about not wanting things to be the way they are. You want something different. That’s because there’s something about the present moment, about the person in front of you, about yourself, that you don’t like. By meditating, practicing compassion and interdependence, you can start to trust that things are OK just as they are. They might not be “ideal,” but they are just fine. Beautiful even. And you start to become more aware of your continual rejection of the present moment, and open up to the actuality of this moment instead. Over and over, this is the practice, opening and investigating the moment with curiosity, accepting it as it is.

Expansiveness. All of these practices result in a more expansive mind, that is not so narrowly focused on its little story of how things should be, not so focused on its small desires and aversions, but can see those as part of a bigger picture. The mind can hold these little desires, and much more. It’s a wide open space, like a deep blue ocean or dreamy blue sky, and the little attachments are just a part of it, but it can also see the suffering of others and their attachments, it can see the present moment in all its flawed glorious beauty, and be present with all of this at once. Practice this expansiveness right now.

Most of us feel it: that lift in spirit you feel when you dig in the garden, set foot on the beach or walk into the woods. As the world becomes more urbanized, fewer of us have those experiences on a regular basis. If you want to experience nature, you have to seek it out.

Richard Louv, journalist, author and co-founder and of the Children & Nature Network is helping galvanize an international movement to connect people and communities to the natural world.

In his book, Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder was focused on how to reconnect children with nature. In The Nature Principle, he calls to action the rest of us. He argues that connecting with and being a part of nature will not just improve creativity and mental sharpness, physical health and wellness; but also build smarter and more sustainable businesses, communities, and economies.

A growing body of research has shown quantifiable evidence that being in nature is good for your mental health. In a recent Stanford-led study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, they looked at the effects of urbanization on mental health. Decreased nature experience has been thought to be the link between urbanization and mental illness, but which mechanism is the link between nature experience and mental illness? They theorized that it has to do with rumination, which is defined as a “– repetitive thought focused on negative emotions” and is associated with heightened risk for depression and other mental illnesses.

In the study, two groups of participants walked for 90 minutes, one in a grassland area scattered with oak trees and shrubs, the other along a traffic-heavy four-lane roadway. Before and after, the researchers measured heart and respiration rates, performed brain scans and had participants fill out questionnaires. The results of the study demonstrate that 90-min walks in natural settings decrease both self-reported rumination and neural activity in the subgenual prefrontal cortex (sgPFC), whereas a 90-min walk in an urban setting has no such effects on self-reported rumination or neural activity. In other studies, the sgPFC has been associated with a self-focused behavioral withdrawal linked to rumination in both depressed and healthy individuals.

This study suggests that having easily accessible natural areas within urban environments is a potentially critical resource, just as Louv and many of his colleagues have been arguing. Bringing nature into our classrooms, our cities and our living spaces can have a broad and significant positive impact.

There is no shortage of relationship advice in this world. Wading through the barrage of information can be overwhelming, but there is information out there that is both useful and practical.

Longitudinal research into relationships can help us to see what it takes to make a relationship successful. Drs. John and Julie Gottman have been systematically studying relationships since the 1970s. They have initiated numerous decades-long studies with thousands of couples that show patterns and predictors that are so consistent that they can predict whether a couple will divorce with an average of over 90% accuracy.

Using this research data, they developed Gottman Method Couples Therapy, a structured, goal-oriented therapy that seeks to help couples achieve greater connections and intimacy in their relationships. Their research shows that couples need to become better friends, create ways to support each other’s dreams and goals and learn to manage conflict. They have broken down the ways to accomplish this into nine components of healthy relationships- and something they call the Sound Relationship House:

Build Love Maps: How well do you know your partner’s inner psychological world, his or her history, worries, stresses, joys, and hopes?

Share Fondness and Admiration: The antidote for contempt, this level focuses on the amount of affection and respect within a relationship. (To strengthen fondness and admiration, express appreciation and respect.)

Turn Towards: State your needs, be aware of bids for connection and respond to (turn towards) them. The small moments of everyday life are actually the building blocks of relationship.

The Positive Perspective: The presence of a positive approach to problem-solving and the success of repair attempts.

Manage Conflict: We say “manage” conflict rather than “resolve” conflict, because relationship conflict is natural and has functional, positive aspects. Understand that there is a critical difference in handling perpetual problems and solvable problems.

Make Life Dreams Come True: Create an atmosphere that encourages each person to talk honestly about his or her hopes, values, convictions and aspirations.

Trust: This is the state that occurs when a person knows that his or her partner acts and thinks to maximize that person’s best interests and benefits, not just the partner’s own interests and benefits. In other words, this means, “my partner has my back and is there for me.”

Commitment: This means believing (and acting on the belief) that your relationship with this person is completely your lifelong journey, for better or for worse (meaning that if it gets worse you will both work to improve it). It implies cherishing your partner’s positive qualities and nurturing gratitude by comparing the partner favorably with real or imagined others, rather than trashing the partner by magnifying negative qualities, and nurturing resentment by comparing unfavorably with real or imagined others¹. You can check out their blog at https://www.gottman.com/blog/

"There is a tendency to want to hurry from autumn to spring, to avoid the long dark days that winter brings. Many people do not like constant days bereft of light and months filled with colder temperatures. They struggle with the bleakness of land and the emptiness of trees. Their eyes and hearts seek color. Their spirits tire of tasting the endless gray skies. There is great rejoicing in the thought that light and warmth will soon be filling more and more of each new day.

"But winter darkness has a positive side to it. As we gather to celebrate the first turn from winter to spring, we are invited to recognize and honor the beauty in the often unwanted season of winter. Let us invite our hearts to be glad for the courage winter proclaims. Let us be grateful for the wisdom winter brings in teaching us about the need for withdrawal as an essential part of renewal. Let us also encourage our spirits as Earth prepares to come forth from this time of withdrawal into a season filled with light.

"The winter solstice celebrates the return of hope to our land as our planet experiences the first slow turn toward greater daylight. Soon we will welcome the return of the sun and the coming of springtime. As we do so, let us remember and embrace the positive, enriching aspects of winter's darkness. Pause now to sit in silence in the darkness of this space. Let this space be a safe enclosure of creative gestation for you."

So embrace the darkest, wettest days, as we move back toward greater light, and spring!

Consciously practicing gratitude by routinely writing down the things you are thankful for can bring tremendous benefits to your health and to your happiness. Multiple studies on the effects of thankfulness highlight particular ways that this is true.

In this season of giving, we tend to focus more on gratitude than we do the rest of the year, but these studies tend to show us that we should be prioritizing thankfulness on a daily basis throughout the year.

People who practice gratitude have more vibrant and supportive social dynamics; sleep better, have healthier immune systems and experience less depression.

Acknowledging the contributions of your coworkers and acquaintances makes them more likely to reach out to you. Grateful people are shown to be more productive workers, more effective managers and better decision makers.

Vocalizing your appreciation for the people in your life can help deepen your friendships, as well as your marriage. Gratitude is an integral aspect of all healthy relationships. A study by Amie Gordon at UC Berkeley showed that on days when one partner reported feeling more appreciated, he or she tends to appreciate his or her partner more the next day. This ongoing reciprocal appreciation is associated with happier, longer lasting relationships.

One particular study at the University of Pennsylvania tested the impact of a variety of positive psychological interventions and compared those with a control assignment where all of the subjects wrote about their early memories. One week, their assignment was to write a letter of gratitude to someone they had never thanked properly. This particular week, the participants immediately exhibited a huge increase in happiness scores. This impact was greater than the impact from any other intervention, and the benefits were measurable for over a month.

Robert A. Emmons, Ph.D., a leading gratitude researcher at UC Davis, has conducted numerous studies on the link between gratitude and psychological health. His research shows that gratitude reduces negative emotions and depressions. Other studies have shown that it reduces stress, helps us overcome trauma and promotes resilience. Those that have more gratitude, cope in a more proactive way- they are more likely to seek social support and to learn from negative experiences.

We have to make a conscious decision to choose gratitude. Once we do this on a regular basis, it can become habit. A habit that can bring us energy, health and an open heart.

References

Danner, D.D.; Snowden, D. and Friesen, W.V. Positive emotions in early life and longevity: Findings from the nun study.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80, (2001): 804-813.

Welcome to the blog for the North Portland Growth Place- Heal, Grow, & Flourish. Here you will find posts pertaining to personal growth and wellness, in keeping with the services offered at The Growth Place by skilled counselors, life coaches, hypnotherapists, and wellness professionals.